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Technology · Artificial intelligence · published 2026-10-10 · via Tom's Hardware

Free Steam Demo's AI Costs Reach $1,000 Daily, Prompting Bank Loan

Image via Tom's Hardware
Image via Tom's Hardware

Easy Fox, the studio behind the free Steam demo Teach My Little Sister How To Drive, took out a bank loan after its AI service costs exceeded $1,000 per day. The game uses Google Gemini and a ChatGPT fallback to process voice commands, and a surge in players made the demo far more expensive than expected. The developers plan to factor expected AI usage into the price of the paid release.

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Easy Fox's free Steam demo Teach My Little Sister How To Drive uses voice commands, with Google Gemini handling recognition and replies and ChatGPT as backup. Average players stayed below ten until late August, reached about fifty by late September, and peaked at 431 on October 1. Daily AI costs then exceeded $1,000, prompting a bank loan to keep the demo online.

The studio plans to fold expected AI use into the paid release's price instead of charging separately for tokens. It also wants local models on capable hardware and is testing alternatives for Russia, where Western services are harder to reach. Gemini

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